1. Field
This invention has to do with powered machines for running along ruts in agricultural fields to largely fill such ruts and smooth the fields so subsequent agricultural operations will not be hampered.
2. State of the Art
A variety of different machines of the type of and for the purpose for which the machine of the invention is concerned have been developed or proposed heretofore, but there remains a need for a more effective machine that is relatively simple and that can be economically produced.
Tractors and other wheeled equipment working in soft or muddy ground leave tracks that develop into deep ruts either immediately or over a period of time. The situation is particularly difficult in the case of center pivot sprinkler irrigation systems in which pneumatically-tired wheels, carrying and powering the sprinkler towers, repeatedly move in large circles over ground made wet and often muddy by irrigation water sprayed from the sprinklers.
Examples of prior art in this filed of inventive activity are shown by U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,887,348 of Nov. 8, 1932; Bean et al. No. 4,059,911 of Nov. 29, 1977; Corsentino U.S. Pat. No. 4,209,068 of June 24, 1980; Parish No. 4,262,752 of Apr. 21, 1981; Davis U.S. Pat. No. 4,308,921 of Jan. 5, 1982; and Parish U.S. Pat. No. 4,601,347 of July 22, 1986. All but one of these machines employ disks at respective opposite sides of the rut, which rotate by reason of ground friction as the machine moves along the rut and which are biased to push earth toward and into the rut, with or without a plow therebetween to loosen soil in the rut and to help keep the machine on track. Freeman employs spring teeth instead of disks and an advance guide wheel therebetween instead of a plow.